Greetings from Team SpanishPod101!

We’re stopping by the blog today to tell you about an exciting new feature we’re slowly rolling out on the website. A few select users have been chosen to test drive the new Dashboard feature.

Log in to your account today to see if you’re one of them!

The new Dashboard aims to help you track your Spanish learning quickly and easily. We’ve produced a lot of lessons in our lifetime and while we pride ourselves on offering a wide variety of lessons to our users, we realized that it can been pretty overwhelming for some.

Where do I start? What level is best for me? What series do I move on to now?

These were common questions coming in from avid users like you, so we set out to solve these commonly asked questions, and the Dashboard was born!

We’ll of course continue to listen to our fans and tweak the Dashboard to provide the very best experience for everyone. If you have questions or feedback for us, send us an email here.

To help you get started, here are a few of the big changes:

• Your learning progress

• Recommended lesson alert

• Your learning profile

• Account information

• Quick links to useful tools

We hope you enjoy the brand new Dashboard! Stay tuned for more tweaks and updates to the site and head over to SpanishPod101.com to test out the new Dashboard beta.

Better than Black Friday. That comes once a year.

This offer is once in a millennium.

Good through Monday:

Click here to get 1-Month Premium for $11.11
(55% OFF the regular price)

or

Click here to get 1-Year Premium for $111.11
(43% OFF the regular price)

That’s every single one of our audio and video lessons, PDF Lesson Notes, My Flashcards, My Word Bank, Core Word Lists, Lesson Quizzes, Review, Dialogue and Expansion tracks and so much more – for $11.11 for a single month, or $111.11 for an entire year!

Don’t let this once in a millennium chance pass you by – it expires Monday, November 14th at midnight! Just pick your deal and get started with our fun and effective Spanish language learning system today!

Click any of the links below to upgrade before it’s gone!

Save 55% on 1-Month Premium — $11.11 for 1-Month

or

Save 43% on 1-Year Premium — $111.11 for 1-Year

Hello Listeners,

Ever attempt math homework? Drive into a traffic jam? Log into Facebook? All are popular and guaranteed ways of getting stuck and getting nowhere.

Unfortunately Spanish is no different. But before you admit shameful defeat and go on Facebook to express your anguish in a status, there’s something that will get you through!

One of the most trusted Spanish dictionaries is now on the Mac.

Together with famous publisher HarperCollins, we’ve brought you the Collins Unabridged English Dictionary and Collins Thesaurus of the English Language. This time, it’s the Collins Spanish Dictionary Complete and Unabridged.

This is the first and last Spanish dictionary you’ll ever need. If you’re feeling stuck, building up your vocabulary base will boost your Spanish from basic to advanced. The Collins Spanish Dictionary Complete and Unabridged is the definitive Spanish-English Dictionary for the Mac.

This app takes 310,000 references and 442,000 translations and packs it down into a sweet browser-like app. With the Collins Spanish Dictionary Complete and Unabridged, you can:

Best of all, it’s clean and streamlined for elegance, simplicity, and speed. Perfect for learners and native speakers of Spanish – whether going from English to Spanish, or Spanish to English!

What’s the lesson? Know your math, avoid traffic, log out of Facebook, and get ahead in Spanish with the Collins Spanish Dictionary Complete and Unabridged for the Mac.

Visit the Innovative Language Store for more information or directly at the Mac App Store.

Hello Listener,

(For maximum impact, read in Old Spice Guy’s voice)

Look at our homepage. Now back to us.
Now back to our homepage. Now back to us.

Look different? It should! With the help of our wonderful users, like you, we’ve listened to your feedback and came up with this. Designing the homepage has been like watching a baby grow.

Our iTunes logo has also changed. You can see it on our Facebook and Twitter accounts!

So when you download our free audio lessons on iTunes and see a new logo… do not be alarmed. It’s still SpanishPod101.

The Old

The New

We’ve decided it was time for a change here at SpanishPod101.
Why the change? Well, We’re not just a podcast website – but a language learning system.

This design makeover is just one small step towards one giant leap to becoming a complete online learning system.

Thoughts on the design? Feedback? Please let us know in the comments below.

But Wait!
What’s that? Look below. There’s a link.
To our 18% OFF Back To School Sale that you’ve always wanted. Look again!
It’s still there but only until August 26th. Sadly, schools don’t lower their costs and neither do student loans. However, we do.

18% OFF any premium subscription. Use Coupon 2COOL4SCHOOL and save!

If you’re taking Spanish this semester, you’re more than prepared. Just don’t sleep in class, unless you’re dozing off to the sweet sounds of a SpanishPod101 audio lesson.

And If you’re not in school (lucky!) – you’re still a student of Spanish. Join in on the discount too!

Note: The Back to School Sale Ends in 48 hours. Save 18% OFF now because your school never does this.

Google is the world’s biggest Search Engine.
Apple is the world’s biggest smart phone maker.
The Blue whale is the world’s biggest animal.

And now, our little Innovative Language Learning family has become the world’s biggest language learning app maker! Apple verified this themselves. Surprised? Us too!

In about 5 years, we’ve made over 600 apps across 40 languages that available on the iTunes store for the iPhone and iPad alone. Not to mention, our Android and Mac desktop apps.

Can you imagine? That’s more language packed in one spot than a United Nations conference. Except you could learn them all. Or some. Mastering 600 apps is only for insane overachievers.

Some of our most popular mobile apps include Survival Phrases for brushing up on essential phrases when you visit a Spanish speaking country, Gengo FlashCards for multi-sensory vocabulary learning, and the recently updated WordPower that gives you the core 2000 words and phrases necessary for daily conversation. The language is directly at your fingertips – you’re touching words and sentences as you learn them!

In fact, you can download some for free or unlock all features with our premium apps.

Head over to our Apps page for the complete list of apps and more information. You can also search the Android Market and iTunes store for “Innovative Language Learning.”

Try them risk free!

Let us know what you think. We update them regularly based on your feedback!

Probably not, but it can get you pretty close. This little app does pack a massive punch – master all the words and you’ll reach 80% comprehension, or in other words, daily conversational level!

But if Gengo WordPower wasn’t powerful enough already, we’ve went ahead and added more power!

In Case You Didnt Know…
The Gengo WordPower App provides you with the Core 2000 Spanish words. According to experts, knowing 2000 puts you at over 80% comprehension (exact number varies per language).

So Whats New?

Gengo WordPower is great for every day situations – whether you’re going to the bank, the doctor, or the airport. We’ve categorized the words down into 75 categories as well!

Here’s how you learn:

The core 2000 words are broken into 75 unique categories – which you go through like levels in a video game!

When you come across words that just wont stick in your brain, place them in the WordBank. Then, review your list of words with Flashcards until you remember.

And if you’re embarrassed about your pronunciation, wait til you hear mine! You can listen to a native speaker’s pronunciation – record your own – and compare the two.

Gengo Wordpower is available for iPhone, iPad, and Android.
Try the Free WordPower Lite or access all features with Gengo WordPower.

You were swimming, weren’t you!?

Don’t worry, just checking.

Summer’s here and we’re in the mood to celebrate this warm joyous season – and what better way to start summer off right than have a Summer Celebration Sale!

Why celebrate summer you ask? Excellent question. Because not only is the sun shining and the ice-cream plentiful, but we also have a lot of NEW things to release. We’re kicking off July with 6 brand NEW languages, NEW Premium Flashcards, NEW lessons AND a NEW discount of 22% OFF for Premium Subscribers.

Click here to get the discount and get all of our new features!

This Fourth of July, we welcome Swedish, Dutch, Hungarian, Hindi, Hebrew and Indonesian to the Pod101 family! Also, our Premium Flashcards are faster, better, and stronger with spaced-repetition and progress tracking that will make you learn vocabulary faster and stronger too. Finally, we’re continuing with the 2nd half of our 2011 season with brand new lessons from your favorite energetic hosts.

But why 22% OFF on all Premium Subscriptions? Why not 17.3%? We’ve debated this extensively and while 17.3 is a fantastic number, we’re using 22% to mark our new total of 22 languages at Interactive Language Learning.

The only catch is that this sale doesn’t last all summer – sale ends July 15th!

Join the Summer Celebration Sale: New Languages, New Premium Flashcards, New Lessons, New 22% Discount, and A New Sunburn (not provided by us). Subscribe for 22% Less and get it all here!

Premium Members, your Premium Account just got a whole lot more powerful! My Flashcards now allows you to study the Spanish words you want by importing lists from audio and video lessons, your My WordBank and the Spanish Core Word Lists 2000. Here’s a quick rundown of the new features:

My Flashcards Dashboard: My Flashcards have a brand new interface. Import words from any audio and video lesson, My WordBank and the Core Word Lists. Create, edit and delete as many decks as you want!

Create a New Deck: How you want to study is completely up to you! You control what displays on the front and back of cards. Create new decks out of the existing words in My Flashcards. Simple pick the words, name your deck and you’re ready to study.

Front of Card Display: The new My Flashcards load fast and are easy to use. Test yourself with native audio recordings. When you’re ready for the answer, simply click on the card to flip it over.

Back of Card Display: Learning sometimes isn’t as simple as just Right or Wrong. Our smart spaced repetition system will evaluate your progress from the three answer choices so you test more of what you need. Get extra review with sample sentences and audio.

My Stats: We track your progress in My Stats. Don’t just learn new words – master them! This chart will keep you motivated to master all the words in your deck!

My Flashcards is still in beta mode, which means, we’re still working out some kinks. If you’re a Premium Member, head over to My Flashcards under My Tools to try them out. These flashcards are part of your Premium Subscription. Something not working? Send us a message at contactus@spanishpod101.com .

Not a Premium Member? For a limited time only, get 1-Month of Premium Access to SpanishPod101.com for only $5 – that’s even cheaper than our regular priced Basic 1-Month Plan! Use coupon code FLASHCARDS at checkout to get Premium for $5.00. Hurry! This offer ends on June 30th, 2011!

Our annual Reverse Christmas countdown begins today with the biggest savings of the year! Save 50% off any Basic or Premium subscription until midnight EST tonight with our Secret Santa Holiday Countdown Tomorrow, the daily deal drops below 50% OFF, so upgrade to Basic or Premium right now. Just click the link below:

Half off SpanishPod101 until midnight EST? Sign me up right now!

Everyday until Christmas, we’re offering a daily deal on our Basic and Premium subscriptions. Act early and save more. It’s as easy as that! We can’t tell you what tomorrow’s deal will be, but we can tell you that it won’t be as good as today’s.

New seasons of SpanishPod101.com begin on January 3rd, so there’s no better time than now to upgrade to Basic or Premium. You don’t want to miss out on all the fun in 2011!

Have a fun and safe Holiday!

Peter & Team SpanishPod101

How to Really Learn Spanish in Just Minutes a Day and Stick with it

The Myth

What if I told you mastering Spanish wasn’t that hard. That actually learning the language itself is not nearly as difficult as you may have heard. And that the problem to progressing is an age old one…failure to execute.

The Real Issue

Said another way, “People don’t progress ’cause they don’t do! If you don’t do the work, you won’t reach your goals.” Read the rest of this post »